It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by. How else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment? for the moment passes, it is forgotten; the mood is gone; life itself is gone. That is where the writer scores over his fellows: he catches the changes of his mind on the hop. Growth is exciting; growth is dynamic and alarming. Growth of the soul, growth of the mind.
Vita Sackville-West

Press Freedom Index

Reporters sans frontières (Reporters without Borders) latest press freedom index shows North Korea, Turkmenistan, and Eritrea as the worst violators of press freedom. They remain with Burma, Cuba and China at the bottom of the list.

France, the United States and Japan slip further into the repression of media criticism, while Mauritania and Haiti gain much ground.

Christmas and the New Year seem to produce more lists than the rest of the year. I don’t have a list of best books, so we’ll have to make do with this, and be glad it’s there.